There's a message in here somewhere about how women have been complaining about how magazines portray an idealistic view of how they should look, but I don't know what it is.

On a more serious note, can we all not just admit that the vast majority of us care at least somewhat about how people look?

I'm not saying it's the most important. I'm not saying most people base decisions/opinions of others just on physical appearance, but I don't think I'm out of line when I say that most of us like it when another person is "good looking" (whatever that may mean to you personally).

The thing that boggled my mind about the study was that 80% of men being "below average" is a mathematical impossibility.

Easy to solve:

*80% of the men on OKCupid are below average looking (from the OKCupid stats)
*50% of all men are below average looking (the definition of average)
=> There exists a population without a profile on OKCupid that are above average looking. If they signed up on OKCupid, then the percentage in the first premise would drop (until either more above average looking men are signed up than below average, or the entire world is signed up to OKCupid).

There's a message in here somewhere about how women have been complaining about how magazines portray an idealistic view of how they should look, but I don't know what it is.

On a more serious note, can we all not just admit that the vast majority of us care at least somewhat about how people look?

I'm not saying it's the most important. I'm not saying most people base decisions/opinions of others just on physical appearance, but I don't think I'm out of line when I say that most of us like it when another person is "good looking" (whatever that may mean to you personally).

They actually address the Magazine thing.

This is a chart they put together of male ratings of female attractiveness.

It's a bell curve. That's pretty much exactly what you'd expect to find in nature.

So, at least on the part of men, women aren't really judged as attractive/ugly based on unattainable Hollywood standards.

---------- Post added 2012-11-14 at 09:13 PM ----------

Originally Posted by Firebert

Easy to solve:

*80% of the men on OKCupid are below average looking (from the OKCupid stats)
*50% of all men are below average looking (the definition of average)
=> There exists a population without a profile on OKCupid that are above average looking. If they signed up on OKCupid, then the percentage in the first premise would drop (until either more above average looking men are signed up than below average, or the entire world is signed up to OKCupid).

Which is kind of obvious.

That makes little to no sense.

Why would an almost perfect distribution of women sign up for OKCupid but almost only unattractive men?

---------- Post added 2012-11-14 at 09:13 PM ----------

Originally Posted by Tziva

I can't look at the link now, but I suspect its an old one from the very awesome OKTrends blog. I haven't seen them post anything new since they sold to Match.com, sadly.

The thing that boggled my mind about the study was that 80% of men being "below average" is a mathematical impossibility.

It's not saying 80% of men are below average, it's saying that women will rate 80% of men that way.

If you show a group of women a thousand pictures of men and have them rate them as "above average" "average" and "below average" and all the women pick "below average" every time. Then you could say 100% of the men scored as "below average" which is a mathematical truth (albeit silly) and quite a bit different then the logically absurd claim that all men are below average.

Originally Posted by Firebert

17th November 2009.

Old news is old, but still relevant for discussion?

Sure, I wasn't trying to say folks couldn't discuss, just that I love/miss that blog

It's a bell curve. That's pretty much exactly what you'd expect to find in nature.

So, at least on the part of men, women aren't really judged as attractive/ugly based on unattainable Hollywood standards.

I know, I was inferring more about what people say/how they say it. As in the complaint that pretty pictures try to present a generally unattainable image and it's demeaning is a bit silly when pretty much everyone to some degree or another does care about appearances.
Well, that and you're complaining about a celebrity glam magazine, which is worthy of no other response ever other than "Meh"

That's rather odd, because OK Cupid told me I'm better than average looking based on the reactions of women to my profile, but I'm pretty damn sure I'm in the average to below average range. I'm tall and not fat (maybe slightly overweight, but no gut), but I've got a big nose, and I can't grow a five o' clock shadow to save my life. So either OK Cupid is lying to me, or they're lying to everyone.

'Twas a cutlass swipe or an ounce of lead
Or a yawing hole in a battered head
And the scuppers clogged with rotting red
And there they lay I damn me eyes
All lookouts clapped on Paradise
All souls bound just contrarywise, yo ho ho and a bottle of rum!